Barnes 110 vs Lehigh 115

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razabak
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Barnes 110 vs Lehigh 115

Post by razabak »

I’ve been using the Barnes 110 Black tips for deer hunting. Shot everything from does to big ol 11pt trophy bucks. Been able to recover every animal I’ve shot so far.

The problem I have is the difficulty in getting a pass through with this bullet. Many times I recover a nice copper mushroom just under the skin on the far side. Just a bit more power would have gotten it through the skin, but I think these big Minnesota deer are just big enough to prevent a pass through.

Without a pass through, almost every shot leaves ZERO blood trail. Sometimes they drop right away but sometimes not. I once had a perfect shot through both lungs on a nice 10pt. Traveled over 300 yards with a chest full of lung mash and didn’t leave a drop of blood. Found it just by luck.

I’m thinking of trying the 115gr Lehigh. The tests I’ve seen show 19” of penetration with the core after fragmentation. Out of my gun they are giving out almost 50ft/lbs of energy more than the Barnes. My thought is if I’m not going to get a pass through anyway, I might as well do as much internal damage as possible.

I’m hoping someone has some real world exp with the Lehigh. Any advice or story’s you can share is much appreciated.
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MMA10mm
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Re: Barnes 110 vs Lehigh 115

Post by MMA10mm »

Tagged for reference.

I load both the 110gr Barnes and 115gr Lehigh CCCu, but haven't gotten a deer with either yet. (My state requires shotgun... :( )

I might suggest loading a box of the Barnes 120gr black tips and see if those make it out the other side as another option...
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Re: Barnes 110 vs Lehigh 115

Post by tallburnedmidget »

razabak wrote:I’ve been using the Barnes 110 Black tips for deer hunting. Shot everything from does to big ol 11pt trophy bucks. Been able to recover every animal I’ve shot so far.

The problem I have is the difficulty in getting a pass through with this bullet. Many times I recover a nice copper mushroom just under the skin on the far side. Just a bit more power would have gotten it through the skin, but I think these big Minnesota deer are just big enough to prevent a pass through.

Without a pass through, almost every shot leaves ZERO blood trail. Sometimes they drop right away but sometimes not. I once had a perfect shot through both lungs on a nice 10pt. Traveled over 300 yards with a chest full of lung mash and didn’t leave a drop of blood. Found it just by luck.

I’m thinking of trying the 115gr Lehigh. The tests I’ve seen show 19” of penetration with the core after fragmentation. Out of my gun they are giving out almost 50ft/lbs of energy more than the Barnes. My thought is if I’m not going to get a pass through anyway, I might as well do as much internal damage as possible.

I’m hoping someone has some real world exp with the Lehigh. Any advice or story’s you can share is much appreciated.
I've killed with both bullets. The deer I have shot are between 80-99lbs generally. They are Texas deer so they are much smaller in body and weight than MN deer.

Now with that said I PREFER the 110gr Barnes on these sided deer because it has always exited and it actually performed better with it's mushroom effect vs the shard effect of the 115gr Lehigh CC on deer THIS SIZE.

With MN sized deer I think the 115gr Lehigh CC would do much better.
The issue with the smaller bodied deer we have and the 115gr CC is that it doesn't start doing it's shard fragmentation until about 3/4 of the way through the deer or even further through. I had a number of exit wounds with ALL the shards exiting in about a 3-4 inch diameter RATHER than the shards fragmenting into the cavity causing maximum chaos.

Again on MN sized deer I think the bullet would start to do it's job about halfway or maybe less than halfway into the cavity so the offside portion of the vitals should get some shards causing chaos... at least I imagine so but the proof would only be found if you tried it.

Either way I didn't get much blood if any with either round even exiting. I've never had much luck with blood and the 300BLk but I also take double lung shots way more often than the slightly lower heart shots.

My tips for tracking are to get real good. Also I turn on my phone's camera on a wide angle shot and start recording so that when I shoot the deer I can see where it was standing and what it ran by, ran in front of, and what where I last saw it leave the picture. Most times the deer doesn't go beyond 150yds but leaves little to no blood trail most of the time.
The camera trick has been by FAR the best tool to help me track these deer when there is a lack of a blood trail.

Last year I went ahead and did my evening hunts with the 30-06 because I didn't want track with little or no blood trail in the dark. I didn't track a single deer from the evening hunt least year :D

Anyhow, I think you could have more success in YOUR case with MN sized deer using the 115gr CC vs what I saw on the handful of deer I killed with the 115gr CC.

I hope this info helps! :)
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rebel
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Re: Barnes 110 vs Lehigh 115

Post by rebel »

razabak wrote:I’ve been using the Barnes 110 Black tips for deer hunting. Shot everything from does to big ol 11pt trophy bucks. Been able to recover every animal I’ve shot so far.

The problem I have is the difficulty in getting a pass through with this bullet. Many times I recover a nice copper mushroom just under the skin on the far side. Just a bit more power would have gotten it through the skin, but I think these big Minnesota deer are just big enough to prevent a pass through.

Without a pass through, almost every shot leaves ZERO blood trail. Sometimes they drop right away but sometimes not. I once had a perfect shot through both lungs on a nice 10pt. Traveled over 300 yards with a chest full of lung mash and didn’t leave a drop of blood. Found it just by luck.

I’m thinking of trying the 115gr Lehigh. The tests I’ve seen show 19” of penetration with the core after fragmentation. Out of my gun they are giving out almost 50ft/lbs of energy more than the Barnes. My thought is if I’m not going to get a pass through anyway, I might as well do as much internal damage as possible.

I’m hoping someone has some real world exp with the Lehigh. Any advice or story’s you can share is much appreciated.
I will give what maybe a controversial opinion on this subject. I would choose neither personally. Though many here have done very well hunting with the Blacktip, it's not really what the bullet was designed for. My old standby is the 125 gr SST. Almost a complete pass through on a 120 lb deer, breaking both shoulders. My new favorite is the 150 speer. I'm not sure that it is not an almost perfect bullet for this caliber as far as hunting goes. We will see.
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dellet
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Re: Barnes 110 vs Lehigh 115

Post by dellet »

The problem with specialty bullets, isn't the bullet, it's improper use or expectations.

A Barnes Tactical Tipped eXpanding bullet is designed to punch through a barrier like a car door, windshield, or shoulder blade then hit soft tissue and slam on the brakes, stopping before it exits and injures someone else.

Most expanding bullets designed for the cartridge meet FBI standards. There is a different set of rules hunting humans than animals.

If you want a bullet to exit the other side, maximum expansion/energy dump, probably isn't what you are looking for.

In all honesty a 300 pound human is probably a lot easier to stop in it's tracks than a 80 pound deer and given 10 seconds to run before they realize they're dead, I know which one will be farther away for where they got shot.
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badguybuster
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Re: Barnes 110 vs Lehigh 115

Post by badguybuster »

Ive used both and had MUCH better results from the Lehigh. The barnes works fine but as stated by the OP has a tendency not to exit. The Lehigh creates quite an explosive exit in my experience. That being said, the 125 SST is better than both in my opinion. Ive used it on both deer and black bear, it has dropped them all in their tracks. IF you can find them, the Speer Gold Dots are the End All, Be All for hunting bullets in .308
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MMA10mm
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Re: Barnes 110 vs Lehigh 115

Post by MMA10mm »

Bumping to see if there are any updates from the 2018-2019 hunting season with the TAC-TX vs. the CCCu?? Also, anyone use 120gr Tac-TX and notice a difference?

In watching some videos, I've also heard some comparisons of the older Controlled Chaos (brass), which said the brass version comes apart quicker with about the first 1/3 of the bullet turning to powder early in the wound tract, second 1/3 fragging into shards, and rear 1/3 punching on through. This is a bit more detailed, but kinda matches TBM's comments in post #3 above. I seem to recall the copper bullet has a lower velocity threshold, though, giving it longer effective range. Any additional thoughts?

Also, in re-reading this thread, lots of mention of the 125gr SST (Hornady, if my memory serves), but I seem to recall the bullet which everyone used to talk about was the Speer 125gr TNT. Has that bullet fallen out of favor?

Sorry for my last question being a bit off-topic.
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bangbangping
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Re: Barnes 110 vs Lehigh 115

Post by bangbangping »

MMA10mm wrote: Sun Apr 14, 2019 10:55 am Bumping to see if there are any updates from the 2018-2019 hunting season with the TAC-TX vs. the CCCu??
I updated from the TAC-TX to the Speer 150 Gold Dot. :mrgreen:

dellet said:
dellet wrote: If you want a bullet to exit the other side, maximum expansion/energy dump, probably isn't what you are looking for.
Very true. I'd add that more energy and greater sectional density help penetration, too. In my rifle with my loads, the gold dot starts out with ~160 ft. lbs. more energy than the black tip. At 200 yards, the difference is ~180 ft. lbs. That's over 20% more. Combined with ~35% greater sectional density and adequate (not explosive) expansion, it will penetrate better. Unless you must shoot a non-lead bullet, in my opinion there is no reason to spend over twice as much for either the TAC-TX or CC.
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Re: Barnes 110 vs Lehigh 115

Post by bearcatrp »

What kind of fps are you folks getting with the Speer gold dots? Please include barrel length and powder used. Am using 120 grain gold dot in my Grendel for my dedicated bullet. Thanks.
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Re: Barnes 110 vs Lehigh 115

Post by ThreeHundredBlackout »

I have shot a good size Wyoming white tail with the 110 Tac-TX and it just fell over, didnt hit the heart and passed through the meat on the fr R shoulder, double lung and broke 2 ribs 1 in 1 out, and broke the fr L lower leg joint.....no bullet recovered....clean pass through. Impact at 117 yds.
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